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Change to Win Statement on the U.S. Senate's Failure to Debate the Confirmation of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board

Wednesday, February 13, 2002

WASHINGTON, DC - Change to Win Chair Anna Burger issued the following statement regarding yesterday's failure of the U.S. Senate to debate the confirmation of Craig Becker to a seat on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

"We are deeply disappointed that the U.S. Senate failed to allow debate and a vote on Craig Becker, who was nominated in April 2009, to serve on the NLRB Board.

"Craig Becker is a highly qualified candidate, with decades of experience as a labor attorney who is known as a bridge builder between the labor, corporate, and academic worlds. He earned labor's unified support because he and a majority of the Senate recognize that he will bring excellence and fair judgment to bear on decisions impacting thousands of American workers each year.

"The Senate's failure to support a full and vigorous debate of his confirmation, despite his majority support out of the Health, Education, and Labor Committee, and after being nominated over nine months ago to fill an urgently needed, essential seat at the National Labor Relations Board, is just another example of American workers being denied and ignored at the whim of small-minded politics on the part of the Republican party and two Democrats.

"Thousands of cases, of hard-working Americans who play by the rules and deserve justice and resolution to disputes on their job, will continue to go unsettled, at a moment when our economic crisis cries out for responsible, constructive solutions from our legislative branch. Instead, the actions of the Republican Senators and Senators Nelson and Lincoln serve to deny workers with a functional governing body to address our most basic workplace laws.

"American workers are in crisis -- facing job losses and insecurity, an unsustainable health care system that leaves tens of millions without adequate coverage and care, and a global economy that challenges the standards and conditions and outcomes that generations have fought to create, which serve as the core of our treasured American Dream. What happened to workers in the Senate today is what happens to them all too often on their jobs -- they are denied the most basic elements of democracy, and the debate and opportunity to choose a new and better direction, because the leaders of the Republican party and two misguided Democrats continue to follow the pressures and dictates of the same Chamber of Commerce crowd that brought us to this economic and social crisis in the first place.

"Change to Win joins with all of labor and responsible business and policy leaders in agreement that Craig Becker is the strongest and best candidate for this position. We stand together in a continued to call for Becker to fill this important position at NLRB, so that we can restore the credibility and functioning of that body to serve our nation's working people."

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The great American middle class wasn’t something that just happened – it was built brick by brick. It was built by soldiers returning from war and a government that repaid them by giving them a shot at college.

What the wealthy and well-connected figured out is that they have strength in numbers: the numbers of dollars they contribute to politicians. It’s time working and middle class Americans use our strength in numbers to reclaim the American Dream. We need a counterweight to the power of big money – and that’s the power of big numbers, the power of ordinary people who work for a living demanding to have our voices heard – from the workplace to Washington.